


I've always loved you and I love you still

by janie_tangerine



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Experimental Style, F/M, I Don't Even Know, Not Exactly Minor JC too, dark content, gratuitous fire & blood canon thrown in because why not, not for cersei fans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:08:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23364472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janie_tangerine/pseuds/janie_tangerine
Summary: in which Jaime and Brienne are forbidden from leaving Harrenhal after the bear pit.alternatively: the author doesn't know what the hell this is and washes her hands off any responsibility.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 40
Kudos: 146





	I've always loved you and I love you still

**Author's Note:**

> ... Right, so, for your coronavirus quarantine fic spree that is obviously telling me to go out of the box because where else would I get variety in my life these days... this is _way_ angstier than my usual. Like. Way. Have at it. Idek.
> 
> Any warnings/disclaimers are in the ending notes as I thought this would work best if not tag-spoiled but feel free to check at whichever point.

1.

“I dreamed of you,” Ser Jaime says, and Brienne’s heart beats faster in her chest - it had been _years_ since it had at the same time as her stomach filled with fluttering butterflies, rising up to reach her throat, and she feels like smiling at him, she feels like taking a step closer and give him one of those kisses maidens always bestow on their knights in the songs because for the first time in her life she’s in the position to do such a thing, and he’s looking at her like he wouldn’t scorn her for it, his tired emerald eyes staring into hers as if he doesn’t regret having wasted days to come back here when everything he seemed to have wanted was to go back to his sister -

“How convenient that you came back,” Vargo Hoat hisses from behind them. “I juth received a mitthive from Lord Bolton.”

He _does_ have a raven in his hands.

It says they should both be held in Harrenhal until he sends them word to do differently.

He’s smiling in a way Brienne doesn’t like at all as he delivers the news.

Ser Jaime shrugs. “Fine,” he says. “Enjoy spending time with your bear _now_.”

Hoat glares at him.

Brienne wishes she wasn’t still feeling like swooning in front of him.

She had thought it was not for her, she had thought Lord Renly and Connington and Ser Wagstaff and Hyle Hunt and the others on the bet had ripped that part of herself from her for good -

But maybe not.

And of course she feels like swooning in front of a man so handsome he looked like half a god even as he sank into the waters in Harrenhal and could barely stand, and who has been in love for all his life with his equally beautiful twin sister, and as much as that should turn her stomach upside down -

He saved her from being raped, _he saved her just now_ , he killed Aerys Targaryen for an honorable, valid reason and never asked anyone for recognition.

He’s not -

He’s not the person Lady Catelyn used to think. She _knows_ he’s not.

And she wants to get to the bottom of it.

Soon.

2.

“I… am sorry that you’re stuck here now,” Brienne tells him later that evening - at the end of things, they were shown a room large enough for two and a guard had been put outside it. Of course it had.

He shrugs, looking at her, then at his feet. His clothing looks dirty and worn out. She can’t help thinking that he should be wearing finery and a good armor, not - _that_.

“I’m not,” he says, and he sounds sure of it. “You didn’t deserve to die like that.” He shrugs, and she can’t reconcile this man with the one that tried to goad her into losing her temper in the beginning of their journey -

Then again, _she_ isn’t the same as she was in the beginning.

“And you don’t deserve to be here,” she says. “That - that was brave, what you did today.” He shrugs again, still not looking at her. He stands up, looking out of the window of the tower, and for a moment she’s reminded of exquisitely illustrated books where Rhaena Targaryen would be drawn in the exact same position, staring out of the window with sad, sad eyes, thinking about all her losses.

( _Brienne always thought the songs about her were among the saddest she ever heard. She wonders, for a moment,_ might it be that she still lingers around here? _, and then shakes her head and tries to forget it. What a foolish thought._ )

“It wasn’t,” he shakes his head.

“It was,” she presses on, her voice trembling, wishing she wasn’t wearing this horrid pink dress that makes her feel naked, “what a true knight would have done.”

“As if you don’t know anything about _that_ ,” he says, and now he sounds almost amused, though he’s still not looking at her.

“... What do you mean?” She asks, her traitorous heart beating faster.

“Wench,” he says, and now it sounds… it sounds _fond_ , not as it did in the beginning. “Wench, _please_. You might not have taken those vows, but you know them. True knights _do_ help the weak, and I might be what I am, but I’m not so full of myself to not realize that... if you hadn’t done it, I’d be dead.”

She shakes her head, standing up. “I swore a vow,” she says.

“I know that,” he says, finally looking at her, the corner of his mouth lifting upwards. “You kept on saying that too, in that dream.”

“What - what was it about?” She asks, her voice trembling.

“I might tell you when I figure it out. Now I think I will rest, if the wench doesn’t mind sharing the room with one such as me.”

She _has_ to smile a tiny bit at that. Not enough to show teeth.

“Ser,” she says, _noticing_ how his eyes go softer when she says it, wondering how long has it been since anyone called him like that _meaning_ it, “Could - could I - would you let me do something?”

“I have all the time in the world, wench,” he says, and so she gathers her courage and leans down ever so slightly, kissing his cheek for a split second.

She leans back. He’s looking at her with wide, wide eyes.

“I - I never - was in the position to do it before. And you have my thanks. Ser.”

He seems about to tell her something else, but then he just nods and goes to lie down on his bed.

Brienne does the same, trying to not think too much about how warm his skin was under the shadow of his growing beard

( _which is neat and clean now, because_ she _shaved him, didn’t she_ )

and tries to go to sleep.

3.

“As it seems like Lord Bolton has forgotten about us,” Ser Jaime says three days later, “and as it seems like I _did_ share my deepest, darkest secret with you, wench, you could at least pay me back the favor.”

Brienne, who had been lying on her bed, pretending to be asleep but knowing she was making a poor job of it, sits and looks up at him.

“I do not have such deep, dark secrets,” she replies.

“Good for you,” he smiles, and she doesn’t know what to make of the fact that _he_ is grinning at her as if he genuinely likes spending time with her. It’s not… the empty smile he flashed at her every other moment, in the beginning. “But I suppose you do have something interesting to share.”

She shrugs, wondering if she can trust him with the few _interesting_ things she has to share, but -

But he saved her life _twice_ and she somehow saved his while they were prisoners, and somehow having ridden with him with a rotten hand in between them makes her reservations seem… little. Empty.

She clears her throat and tells him about her suitors, and then about the bet, not quite looking at him.

When she does, at the end of it, she finds it in herself to meet her eyes. He’s not smiling anymore. He looks… half-pained.

“Ser?” She asks.

“To think,” he whispers, “that I would glare into oblivion anyone I saw trying to do the same to my brother, once upon a time. But - wench, honestly, anyone who has seen you fight and would want to take that from you would be a downright fool.”

He sounds… cautious. Like he’s _trying_ the compliment. Like he doesn’t know what waters he’s treading.

Guess what, neither does she.

“Thank you,” she says, her voice choked. “I appreciate it. But - I made my peace with it.”

“Well, sure as the seven hells you’re more of a true knight than your precious Renly’s men. Since when do _true knights_ who have sworn to protect women bet on their maidenhead? Even _I_ know that,” he snorts, his eyes turning sad, and she remembers what he said about Queen Rhaella, she remembers that he almost _died_ to save her from -

She stands.

“You _do_ know,” she whispers, “that no one could have expected a novice of six and ten to save a single woman from an entire court.”

“Maybe I know that,” he says, not quite looking at her. “But that’s not how that novice had felt back in the day. And he had tried to not think about it too much, but it’s not working too well.”

She nods, not quite sure of what to tell him, but he doesn’t push her away when she puts a hand on his shoulder, tentatively. “Well,” she whispers, “you saved _this_ one. And she’s grateful for it.”

“I told you, it was a debt repaid,” he huffs, not quite looking at her.

“Not to me,” Brienne says, feeling bolder than she has in a long, long time, and then she kisses his cheek again.

He keeps on looking at her as if he can’t believe she’s done it _twice_.

“Maybe,” he says, “I also owe you one, for… what you did on the road, wench.”

“There is no need -”

“I insist,” he says, mock curtsying, and then he moves closer and kisses her cheek, too, and she shudders as his warm, soft lips touch the edge of her cheekbone, which is _splattered_ in those freckles she wishes she didn’t have.

“There,” he says, “wasn’t too hard, was it?”

Brienne, who doesn’t know if she should faint more because he _recognized her as a fellow knight_ or because he _kissed her_ , nods once, words not coming to her.

“Good,” he says, and then heads to his bed, too.

She smiles to herself the entire night.

She knows there is no way this is not going to turn out sour.

Somehow, she doesn’t care.

4.

When the raven with the news about the Twins comes, Brienne finds out that Ser Jaime _would_ let her cry on his shoulder without her asking to - the moment she reads it, she breaks down in sobs that she tries to hold in until he tentatively puts his arms around her and she loses it as she weeps against his shoulder, and gods, no one that wasn’t her father or maybe Lady Catelyn ever would have even _thought_ of doing it, and gods Lady Catelyn is _dead_ -

“I - wish I could say I am surprised,” he whispers later, when she’s half-calmed down. “But - it’s my father. I’m not.”

_(_ And so he spoke, and so he spoke, the lord of Castamere _, resonates in her head, and she tries to_ not _think about it_ -)

“Surprised? Or in agreement?”

“I like to own up to my own killings,” he says, “and - wench, honestly. The Kingsguard _did_ have a positive side to it, at the end of all things.”

“Such as?” She asks. “Your -”

“That I didn’t have to be his pawn anymore,” he snorts, shaking his head. “I hated it. And there is a reason why my brother loathes him, but at least he can do that openly because Father never really gave him a chance. Me, though? He never quite accepted that I could want anything other than being his heir.” He sounds _sad_ about it. “Then again - never mind that. I - I had no idea -”

“Ser,” she says, wiping her eyes, “ _ser_ , please. I know. You were in a dungeon for a year, we were together the rest of the time, you proved yourself to be entirely more honorable than you would let people believe, you _couldn’t_ have known.”

His side is still pressed against hers, his hand on her back. Brienne feels its touch as if it were scalding.

“Hells, this his - wench, you’re throwing me in for a loop,” he says, tiredly, but when he looks at her he doesn’t sound like he minds too much.

“I am… doing what?”

“Please,” he says, “people that aren’t my brother usually don’t care to hear my side of the story nor concern themselves with whether I am _more honorable than I let them believe_ and don’t - think I don’t have shit for honor. And regardless of that you still helped me out when you hated me, and -”

“I swore a vow and I want to be a knight,” she says, “and I don’t know how your father sees it, but you _needed_ help. How could I have looked at myself again if I let you die?”

“I know you swore a vow,” he whispers, looking down at his left hand, his fingers holding on to the stump of his right one, still bandaged - she cleaned it in the morning. “And you certainly _did_ remember it, in that dream.”

“The - the one that made you go back?”

He takes in a deep breath and looks back at her, and he’s not smiling and he’s looking the way he did in the bath, just - just _more focused_.

“I have kept on thinking about it,” he confesses, “and part of me wishes I could forget it, and maybe before - before they took my hand, I _could_ have. I am quite good at ignoring what I don’t want to deal with.” He laughs for a moment, then goes back to uttermost serious. “I was in Casterly Rock,” he confesses, “and I had to walk underneath it, and there were my father, my sister and my fucking thrice-darned son that I wish I never fathered waiting for me, and they _all_ left me there when I asked them to stay. Well, no, I only asked Cersei, but - that’s not the point. The point is that they left and then _you_ showed up and you kept on repeating that you swore a vow and that you would keep me safe and you _never_ left. That was it. And then I woke up and I knew I couldn’t leave you behind, and maybe when we left Riverrun I only cared to go back to - to my sister, but now I don’t regret that we’re here and that I’m not there. And I don’t even know what I’m fucking trying to tell you, but - I couldn’t keep it for myself anymore, wench. Not now.”

Maybe, in other circumstances, she would have just told him she was flattered he’d think of her like _this_.

But she’s _tired_ and her lady is dead and her king is dead and he’s just let her cry on his shoulder the way no man that wasn’t her father would have, and he just - he said _he doesn’t know what he’s trying to tell her_ , and maybe he really doesn’t, but didn’t he say that he’s never - that he’s never looked at anyone that wasn’t his sister? Brienne cannot presume that _she_ of all people would make him _look_ , but - but she has looked, oh she _has_ , and she’s remembering how she had been about to faint herself when he fell into her arms in the baths, and -

Her mouth is on his before she can think of doing something more sensed, like _not kissing him_ , but then he gasps into it and his left hand carefully, carefully touches the back of her head and _he’s kissing her back_ , and he sighs into it like _he_ is a swooning maiden, and Brienne has to pull back because her head is about to start spinning, but when she opens his eyes he’s looking at her like he’s about to cry harder than _she_ was just before.

“Oh,” he says, “I -”

“I’m sorry,” she says, “I shouldn’t - I shouldn’t have done that, it was improper, I know you -”

He shakes his head and kisses her _again_ , and then he moves back and -

“Wench - _Brienne_ ,” he chokes, “I think it was what I was hoping you’d do. And I don’t know what to do with it because I never - I never felt like this for other women, but -”

Brienne should really stop this here. But - but she _can’t_ , and she’s tired and he said he wanted her to, and so what if it’s going to be just this once and then he goes back to his sister when it’s inevitably the moment?

“Ser Jaime,” she whispers, her voice trembling, “this might sound… rather horrible of me, but I think I can take my own decisions. In _this_ moment, right now, do - do you _truly_ want me?”

“What if I do?” He asks, his left hand still carefully caressing her hip through the stained pink cloth that they haven’t let her change yet. Gods. He sounds like he means it.

Brienne _was_ about to give her maidenhead to fucking Hyle Hunt.

She thinks that at this point she’s beyond caring how much she will inevitably regret this.

“Then have me,” she says, “I don’t care for what happens later.”

“I cannot - you’re a _maiden_ -”

“And it did me no favors,” she smiles. “They call me one _mocking_ me, ser. I think I would rather know I lost it to you, at this point.”

He takes a moment in which he’s completely, wholly still -

And then he’s kissing her again, and _again_ , and dragging her on top of him, and -

In the next hour or so, Brienne finds out that he’s very much skilled with his tongue and that he has no reservation using it to lick and kiss her cunt and make her peak, and she finds out that even if he lost muscle he still looks like a god under his old, worn-out clothing, and that his golden hair is soft as silk even if it hasn’t been cared for in so long, and that when she moves cautiously on top of him and rides him until they’re both panting and moaning and whispering each others’ names he’s warm and he presses up into her touch like a sunflower turns to the rays of the sunset, and his lips are warm and his teeth only ever grasp her skin very lightly, and after she’s peaked thrice and he’s peaked twice she takes him in her mouth and he comes for the third time moaning like it’s the best thing that’s happened to him in the last few years and maybe it _is_ , all things considered -

And when it’s all said and done, he moves so that his back is against her chest, and when Brienne holds him close to her she only regrets that this can never last.

“Brienne?” He asks into the night, his hand grasping her wrist.

“Yes?”

“I - I don’t know what happens now,” he whispers. “I - I wear white, I -”

“I knew when I about proposed you,” she interrupts him. It was her choice. She _wanted_ it to happen.

“Yes, I meant - I _will_ try to convince my sister to hand the Stark girls back to you. Maybe bring them to Tarth, hide them somewhere, I don’t know, but I swore a vow with you and it’s the only one I think I can keep. And -” His voice breaks. “I won’t swear vows I don’t know for sure that I can keep anymore. Sometimes I thought it might drive me insane if I did again. You understand this, don’t you?”

He sounds almost desperate as he asks, his grip stronger than one might have assumed.

“It’s all right,” she tells him, “I do. I swear I do. I wouldn’t ask it of you. I know.”

“I just -” He shakes his head, curling closer against her. “After Aerys - I _can’t_. I can’t take it another time, not _from you_.”

She nods against his neck. “It’s all right. _I know_. I know you will honor it.”

She feels him relax in her hold. “Thank you,” he whispers.

\--

The next day, a raven comes, with Joffrey’s sigil underneath.

It says that the marriage between Sansa Stark and Tyrion Lannister was annulled, that Jaime is removed from the Kingsguard, and that _he_ has to marry her, in Harrenhal, where the Queen Regent will come to organize the entire thing.

Brienne doesn’t need to ask Jaime his opinion.

The way he literally blanches before throwing up in his chamber pot says all.

\--

Later, much later, during the night, after she fucks him slowly into their uncomfortable mattress, as she holds him to her anyway even if she knows the more they do this the worse things will be when the royal court arrives, he whispers, “I wish it had been you.”

It’s so low it was barely audible. Maybe he thought she was asleep.

She tries not to cry against his neck and to remind herself that this was never going to have a happy ending and that it was never in the cards for _her_.

5.

_This_ , Jaime knows, was not how he had thought he would see his sister again.

She’s dressed in black and green, her perfectly curled hair falling over what part of her breasts the neckline doesn’t hide, and her eyes are a cold shade of emerald that he doesn’t remember ever seeing leveled at _him_ …

( _ ~~or maybe he had willingly chosen to ignore it?~~_ )

Same as he wishes he could ignore how her mouth is drawn in a tight line and she’s looking at his right wrist in disgust.

This is _wrong_.

This is so wrong, and she shouldn’t look at him like this, and for a moment he wonders, _can she see that I have been with another woman_ , but - no. That would be nonsensical. He’s bathed before seeing her, and as much as he feels like she _should_ know because he had never thought he’d look at another woman like _that_ and she should know he wasn’t faithful... he also knows his sister well enough to imagine what would happen to Brienne if she knew.

Part of him wants to deny it.

He thinks he’s too tired to. He knows. So he won’t say anything.

“Jaime,” she says, “I see Lord Bolton didn’t lie.”

“ _Cersei_ ,” he replies, “what is this about?”

She shrugs, glaring at him as if she’s immensely displeased that he asked the question. “What _should_ it even be about? Your brother couldn’t bring himself to be useful _for once_ and he never touched the girl when we _need_ a heir to secure Winterfell, and you certainly cannot _protect_ anyone with that hand missing.” She scoffs. “Which is why I told Father that he should dismiss you from the Kingsguard and have _you_ marry her.”

“ _You_ told him?” Jaime breathes, feeling his blood run cold.

She can’t -

No.

No, _she_ can’t have done it, she -

They always said it was the both of them against everyone else, she couldn’t have suggested him marrying someone else -

“Of course,” she says, “it’s what we need right now. And if I could bear Robert for years, _you_ certainly can -”

“ _Cersei_ ,” he chokes, “what happened to you? _You_ are the only one I want,” he says, and has to swallow down bile as he does because it’s a lie and he knows it is and he hates that he’s doing it to Brienne who never asked to be disrespected like this, except that she said she knew and that she hadn’t expected him to stay or to _not_ go back to her, and this makes him feel _worse_ , so much worse -

“You,” she says, “are being needlessly sentimental. We’re not Targaryens and I certainly cannot marry _you_ , and that little bitch has to give us Winterfell. _You_ will marry her and _I_ will be in the room to make sure you _do_ put a child in her or at least take her maidenhead so no one can protest, and I will keep on being there until you do. Then you can have her poisoned after she gives birth, for all I care.”

If Jaime’s blood had run cold before, now it’s icy.

“I can’t,” he says, and is it the first time he tells her no?

He can’t remember.

He thinks it is.

 _He thinks it is_ -

( ~~maybe he had at some other point but he can’t remember that, there are a lot of times he was with her where he knows they were together but he can’t remember what happened~~ )

“Jaime, I don’t think you realize that you do _not_ have a choice in the matter,” she says, her tone sweet but her eyes cold as she reaches him in the middle of the room, her fingers grasping his shoulder.

They hurt.

They hurt in the way her blows do before he turns them into kisses, they -

“I can’t,” he pleads, “she’s - she’s what, three and ten? I don’t want a girl of three and ten who’s just barely flowered. I don’t _care_ for -”

“I think our newest ally could give you a few lessons when it comes to _that_ ,” Cersei smiles, and wait, _Walder Frey_?

As if he wants to be anything like Walder Frey, Seven Hells -

He shakes his head. “Cersei, _please_ , I never asked anything of you, you can’t - the only reason I was let go is that I swore Catelyn Stark that we would release her daughters to her sworn sword, I _swore a damned vow_ , I can’t -”

“And since when has _that_ ever mattered to you?”

“You don’t get it,” he presses, “it does now. Please, I said I’d let her and her sister go -”

Suddenly, she seizes his left wrist, twisting, and hells it _hurts_ , it hurts and when he tries to move closer so he can kiss that away she moves away in disgust the moment his right wrist touches her side.

“Her sister,” she says, icy cold, “hasn’t been seen in King’s Landing since her father died, and Sansa Stark is our key to Winterfell, so you can _forget_ your stupid vows. And I see that I have to make sure Lady Stark’s _sworn sword_ is properly locked up, because obviously spending too much time with her has gotten to your head. This isn’t you, Jaime. _This isn’t you_.”

 _But it is_ , he wants to say, _it’s who I’ve always been, how can’t you see it_ -

“I just -”

“ _I_ would never put such foolish notions before our needs,” she says, “and after you get her with child you can still be with me.” She smiles now, sickly sweet, and it’s not - it’s not her smile, it’s not the smile he remembers, _how could it not be_ \- “So I suggest you realize that you have no choice in this. The girl is here. You’re marrying her tomorrow. There is no discussion to be had. Understood?”

She twists harder.

“Leave the wench out of this,” he whispers, trying to at least achieve that. “She did nothing but keep me alive.”

“Oh, and _whole_?” Cersei sneers, letting his wrist go. “You’re not in your right mind. You’re not leaving your room until tomorrow. And don’t worry, _she_ won’t be there when you go back.” Her hand goes to his cheek, and suddenly he doesn’t want it there, he wants _Brienne’s_ , he wants -

_( ~~did cersei ever care for what he wanted~~_?)

“And think about it twice before displeasing me,” she says, and then pushes him away hard enough he almost falls back on the ground. “Escort him back to his rooms,” she says, raising her voice.

Back in his

( _ ~~their~~_ )

room, Brienne isn’t there anymore.

6.

He considers his options.

He considers his options all night long.

But there is no way out of them. If he refuses, Cersei will most likely have Brienne’s head or _someone’_ s head, probably his. If he tries to run - how can he try to run when he doesn’t even have a sword and there are five guards stationed outside his room and he doesn’t have _his right hand_?

Gods, the girl is _three and ten_ , and Cersei wants to _be there to make sure he_ -

If Tyrion didn’t bed her, then she most likely didn’t want him, and of course she wouldn’t - their family _killed hers_ , of course she wouldn’t, and hells, the idea of touching her makes him want to retch, and then he realizes that his sister and his father want him to be -

_They want him to be Sansa Stark’s Aerys Targaryen._

He falls to his knees and throws up in the chamber pot again, his right wrist throbbing as he tries to hold it with the left, and there’s no Brienne to help him clean up his beard or hold back his hair, and gods, he _swore her a vow and he won’t be able to keep it_ and he’s going to disappoint the only person who was bothered to hear him out and actually think he had a shred of honor left, and _couldn’t it have been her_ -

Jaime Lannister never really considered a life that wasn’t the one he lived.

He took the white

( _ ~~because cersei asked and wasn’t it what he thought he wanted at all, but he swore knightly vows and now he has to hurt a bloody~~_ girl of three and ten _that’s exactly the contrary of what he swore oh gods why_ )

and he spent years telling himself it was what he wanted and that he didn’t mind not raising his children or that he couldn’t ever be close to them, and that he didn’t mind waiting for Cersei when she had time, because _that_ was - because he loved her and she loved him and no one else understood it, no one else could -

But if he had to marry, if he _could_ , if he had to have children -

Gods, he doesn’t want them with a girl twenty years younger than him who most likely wouldn’t _want_ them either,

( ~~not with him~~ )

he doesn’t want them to be his sister’s pawns same as the ones he already fathered, he doesn’t want to force anyone to be with him, he doesn’t want _any_ of this, and Cersei recoiled in disgust at the sight of his wrist when Brienne has kissed it more than once, and he - the way he wants Brienne is not the way he wants his sister, not now, not ever, and he wouldn’t want to marry someone he barely even knows, he would take _her_ instead all over again -

( ~~someone who _understands him_ , someone who listened to him, someone who was gentle and kind and who kissed him first, someone who deserves a good man and not _him_ , someone who gave him her maidenhead willingly and will most likely regret it~~)

\- but he cannot, and he realizes that the one thing he ever did in his life that neither his father nor Cersei had a hand in has been killing Aerys and only Brienne doesn’t rue him for it _knowing the entire story_ -

He stays on his knees, with tears falling on his cheeks that he doesn’t even realize are there until he can taste them.

He thinks he can’t do this.

He thinks he’ll go away inside for a very, very long time.

7.

The next morning, he says nothing when maids show up and drag him down to the hot tubs. He lets them wash him and dress him, and if they feel _wrong_ and their hands make him flinch and he hates how impersonal and cold and they are, and he hates that they’re obviously finding it a chore

( ~~it hadn’t felt like one if brienne did it~~ )

[ _he wonders, if it had been Brienne he was marrying, would she have helped him, would she have been gentle and kind and careful all over again?_ ]

and if a small part of him is screaming that he wants _someone else_ to do it, he ignores it. He lets them trim his beard and dry his hair and dress him in finery that feels _wrong_ on him and that he wants to tear off at once and drag him out to the Hall of the Hundred Hearths where he’s brought to stand in front of a septon who looks at him in disgust.

He feels nothing throughout the entire time, and he keeps on feeling nothing when he sees Cersei dragging Sansa Stark towards him.

The way she holds her arm, it’ll bruise.

( ~~jaime knows it even too well. it always used to bruise when she touched him like that~~ )

[ _Brienne wouldn’t have done that, she hadn’t left him a bruise since that fight that he goaded out of her, and she wouldn’t have looked small and frail drowning in a gray cloak that she didn’t want, she would have looked magnificent in whichever garb she had chosen and she could have brought her sword with and she would have been both a beauty and a knight, he knows that deep down_ ]

He should say something. He should stop this. He knows he won’t and he hates that he knows he won’t -

( ~~ohgodsitslikeaerysalloveragain~~ )

[ _Brienne_ would _have found a way, after all she never considered going away inside, she wanted to bite their damned ears off before they could touch her and here he is not doing anything as usual and he doesn’t even know how to gods he’s such a disappointment, Arthur Dayne would hate to see him now_ ]

When Cersei leaves the girl near him, shaking like a leaf, she holds his right wrist before leaving them be, pressing down on the still tender scarring so hard he wants to scream, but it’s all right. Like this - like this, he doesn’t really feel pain.

( ~~so it’ll bruise.~~

~~who cares.~~

~~he’s fine.~~

~~he’s gone away inside.~~

~~he won’t feel a thing.~~ )

[ _She had looked bruised red and purple in the bath, he remembers, because she got kicked by fucking Rorge for_ him _hadn’t she, it showed under that pink dress, too, they hadn’t faded, and he couldn’t believe anyone would take such pain for_ him _but he hadn’t let himself think about it_ ]

He barely hears the septon speak, and when it’s obvious he can’t tie a cloak around the girl’s shoulders Cersei says she’ll do it for him, sounding like she _cares_ when he knows she doesn’t, and he has to kiss her for a moment, and if he was _here_ he’d feel sick, but he’s not, he’s not -

( ~~this is not how he wished he could not be only a warrior, this is nothing he ever asked for gods if she’s his second half why doesn’t she understand that hedoesntwantthisnotatall~~ )

[ _He would have kissed Brienne properly, if she had worn his coat. She’d have probably tied it for herself without making him pass for a cripple, she would have smiled at him and said that she couldn’t believe someone would want her for real and he would have said of course I do before kissing her another time_ ]

“Father will _love_ to know that you finally are going to live up to his name,” Cersei whispers in his ear as she moves closer to him, pretending to kiss his cheek before she does the same with Sansa, and if he was _here_ he’d feel like vomiting and wherever he looks he knows he won’t find any help and that no one in this room gives a fuck about what _he_ wants or what _Sansa_ wants -

( ~~they always said that he was supposed to protect cersei or at least that was how things always were but somehow at some point he can’t remember when he had assumed that it was not a one-sided thing, if he wanted her to be safe and happy then certainly she wanted the same for him because they were the same person and so they had to want the same things but he doesn’t want this _he doesn’t_ she’s not caring she’s looking at him like he’s worth anything just if he’s useful or just if he doesn’t what she wants and he hates it _hehatesithehatesit_ god has he ever felt hatred for cersei but he thinks he does right now and he hates that she’s not what he had always thought she was~~)

[ _He keeps on thinking about that Brienne he saw in his dream, the one who said that she’d keep him safe over and over, and the_ real _one who actually did it for real and she barely even know him, and he wishes she could do it now but she can’t and why would she want to, she believed in him and now she has to be so wildly disappointed, she kept her vows the best she could and he couldn’t manage actually he did his worst_ ]

And then he has to escort Sansa Stark to the banquet, turns to his left and sees Brienne standing there, wrists chained, some six guards flanking her so that she can’t fight them, looking at him with wide, _sad_ blue eyes, and the worst thing is that she doesn’t even seem disappointed as he had been sure of. She seems resigned, and at _that_ he can’t -

He can’t stay away anymore, and suddenly his eyes are burning and each single muscle of his body feels in pain, and he’s shaking his head and mouthing _I’m sorry I swear I tried_ , and -

 _I know_ , she mouths back, _I forgive you_ , and then she’s dragged back by a few guards and Cersei is telling Sansa that her mother couldn’t have found a worse sworn sword if she wanted her back, and Jaime wants to scream that she doesn’t know what she’s talking about and gods, he doesn’t want -

He doesn’t _want this_ -

He doesn’t -

 _He doesn’t_.

( ~~but has it ever mattered?~~ )

[ _To Brienne, it did matter, didn’t it_?]

8.

He’s not tasting his food (more like shoving it in his mouth) when he thinks he hears a voice whispering in his ear.

It’s a woman.

It’s a woman he’s never heard before in his life.

 _You don’t have to just lie back and take it_ , it whispers.

 _And who would you be?_ He asks back, not opening his mouth. Gods. He is losing his wits, he is, _he is_ -

 _My lord Lannister, I see you didn’t pay attention during your history lessons. Someone who has been in your situation more than once is buried in this castle, you know_.

Jaime never was much of a historian when it wasn’t about knights or battles, _but_ -

But he’s not _so_ ignorant he wouldn’t remember that.

 _… I am not talking to the ghost of Rhaena Targaryen_ , he thinks to himself.

 _And what if you are?_ She says, sounding like she’s sorry for him. Like she _gets_ it. _I do live here. I like it better than most places I have lived in. And I never was much for letting other people dictate my life_.

He swallows a piece of meat that tastes rotten.

_And what should I do according to you?_

Gods, he _is_ losing his wits -

_I can tell you that marrying someone you do not want and someone you cannot trust will only bring you pain, and that people taking your children from you or wanting to raise them is the most painful thing there is after being sold like cattle. Which is what is happening to both you and your young bride._

_I don’t want her to be_ , he pleads.

 _I know,_ she replies, sweetly, sweeter than Cersei but not as sweetly as Brienne -, _which is why I want you to think about something. I also was sold to mine own uncle to wed him, too_. _He also only ever cared about me when it came to what I could do for him, but differently from you I never lied to myself about it and I never thought he loved me. You might do well to open your eyes._

Jaime blinks, swallowing more meat he can barely force himself to not retch.

 _What do you mean?_ He asks, but she doesn’t reply anymore.

“My lord?” Sansa Stark asks, her voice so tiny it’s barely audible. “Are you all right?”

Jaime stares at his half-full plate. He barely remembers having eaten at all.

He tries to smile at her. He knows it’s not working. “Yes, my lady.”

She doesn’t seem convinced and goes back to her food.

He eats some more.

 _What did Rhaena Targaryen do when she wed Maegor?_ , he thinks, and then he almost chokes on his last spoonful.

Oh.

 _Oh_.

Now he remembers.

And -

There is no way he can survive such a thing, if he tries. He knows that. He’s not even sure he would want to. He certainly wouldn’t be _meant_ to. But -

 _But_.

At least, he would honor his vow.

And Brienne could take the girl and bring her away.

_You can honor your vow_ , Brienne’s voice says in his head, and she’s _sweet_ all over again.

 _The one you swore me_ , Catelyn Stark joins her, and she’s… well. Kinder than Cersei.

He can.

Oh, _he can_.

He reaches out and pours himself some wine, his hand shaking.

Then he quietly, discreetly reaches for a sharp knife near him that no one is using and slips it inside his boot.

\--

 _I shall be delighted to escort both my brother and my new sister to their chamber_ , Cersei says later, her smile dripping venom, sounding so satisfied Jaime wishes she could choke on it.

Sansa is shaking like a leaf.

When he touches her shoulder to steady her, she flinches away.

Fair.

She won’t have to worry for much longer.

9.

The feast goes on when the Queen Regent goes back upstairs. There is no bedding, but no one protests it. Wine is poured, food is eaten, and nothing of import happens for the next round of drinking -

Until a scream coming from upstairs silences the entire banquet.

 _That was Sansa Stark_ , a lord says.

 _What could have happened?_ Another echoes.

 _Certainly didn’t sound like a bedding_ , a third states. Everyone stands, hands going to their swords, even if no one is too sure that they want to run upstairs in case it’s nothing and the Queen gets ideas that they wanted to check on Sansa Stark’s wellbeing - she had been extremely clear about how little she was concerned for _that_.

They don’t have to, though.

A moment later, a door crashes open and Sansa Stark appears on top of the stairs, pale as a ghost, shivering in her wedding dress -

Which is immaculate white, except for blood staining the hems.

“My lady,” Lord Garlan Tyrell says, coming closer to her, holding out a hand, “what happened?”

The girl bursts out in tears.

“He said - he told me he was sorry,” she wails, “and then he took out a knife and he said it was the only way and now he’s calling for _her_ -”

“He’s calling for _whom_?” Lord Garlan presses, assuming that _he_ has to be Jaime Lannister.

Sansa Stark looks at him, teary blue eyes wide and frightened, but - she’s obviously not - she hasn’t lost her wits as he had presumed for a moment. Not at all. The entire contrary.

“Ser Jaime,” she says, taking a deep breath, “is calling for _Lady Brienne_ , and I suggest - I suggest you bring her out of the dungeons before he comes looking for her downstairs.”

“But the Queen said to keep her under lock -”

Sansa Stark _laughs_.

She laughs very, very bitterly.

“My lord,” she smiles, all courteous and polite and not meaning it at all, “the Queen is _dead_.”

10.

_It’s wrong._

_Everything is wrong._

_The bed is there, his cloak is on the chair nearby, but he can’t see_ hers _._

_Brienne’s cloak should be blue and pink._

_Why is there just red around this room?_

_Jaime shakes his head, glancing around it._

_No, there’s just his own cloak._

_Maybe she went out for air. He doesn’t quite remember._

_“Jaime?” Her voice asks, from outside the door._

_“Brienne?” He replies, overjoyed at hearing her sound so happy, and having dropped that_ Ser _._

_She called him Jaime._

_Gods, she did, she_ did _, and he feels his heart beat faster, and he feels himself smile as his hand curls around that dagger he had kept just in case._

_They’re in Harrenhal after all._

_Vargo Hoat is still here._

_And while she did swear she’d keep him safe,_ he _could do the same for her, he did, and so he brought it… just in case._

_“Jaime, I’m here,” she calls from the outside. “You were too early. You need to come get me downstairs.”_

_He imagines her standing there, waiting for him, wearing that pink dress that she might hate, but he couldn’t imagine marrying her in anything else._

_He smiles again. He takes the cloak with._

_Maybe she’ll want it for the chill._

_He goes downstairs, calling her name._

11.

Brienne certainly isn’t expecting anyone to come free her.

But when the guards come and say that she has to go to the main hall and _fast_ because fucking Jaime Lannister isn’t in his right mind and he wants _her_ and no one else and no one wants to die because he has gone mad and he has a knife and he can use it, handless or not.

“What?” She asks. “He has - _what_?”

“No questions,” the guard says, dragging her forward. “There’s no fucking time. Who knows if he’s going to lose his wits for good or not.”

Brienne keeps her mouth shut and lets them lead her to the hall, _again_ -

To find herself in front of a scene she could have never imagined in her wildest dreams ( ~~or nightmares?~~ ).

Everyone is standing to either side of the hall, food and wine forgotten. Sansa Stark is holding on to Garlan Tyrell’s arm and her dress is slightly bloodied, but she’s here and alive and she looks fine.

Who is not fine is -

“Brienne?”

It came from -

Oh.

Jaime is in front of her, but he’s giving her the shoulders, and he’s calling out for her urgently, like he’ll _die_ if she doesn’t show up right this moment, and there’s Sansa’s wedding cloak on his right arm, and he’s holding a bloody knife in the left hand, and everyone is giving him a wide berth -

“Jaime?” She calls out to him, leaving the guards behind, moving behind him, and he suddenly goes still before tentatively turning towards her -

And then she understands what must have happened.

Because it’s not just the knife that’s bloody. His _entire hand_ is, as if he stabbed someone more than once or as if he cut their throat and blood spilled all over him, because there’s blood on his silken chemise and on his face and his breeches, but he doesn’t seem to notice, not when his eyes _light up_ as he finally sees her.

 _The Queen is dead_ , she hears whispered behind her.

The Queen is -

Oh.

What had he said, before?

_I won’t swear vows I don’t know for sure that I can keep anymore. Sometimes I thought it might drive me insane if I did._

“Brienne,” he breathes, relieved, “you forgot your cloak.”

She’s about to say, _that’s not mine_.

But then -

Then he’s offering it to her.

“I don’t really remember how I managed to tie it before,” he says, sounding maybe a bit sheepish, “but I liked seeing it on you.”

She could say, _I’ve never worn it_.

But -

 _I wish it had been you_ , he had whispered.

Could it be that he killed his sister to prevent the bedding, then he couldn’t handle the weight of it and now he thinks _she_ is the one he married because _she_ was the one he wanted?

She can dissuade him of that notion.

_Or -_

She takes it from him slowly, unfolding it.

It’s too short for her, and red and gold goes terribly with the forsaken pink dress.

She puts it on her shoulders regardless, tying it herself.

“Thank you, my love,” she says, the words catching in her throat, “I was feeling restless and I wanted to - to go somewhere outside, before coming upstairs.”

The way his eyes light up when she calls him _my love_ , she wants to cry. Maybe she should have called him like that before. It would have been true then as it's true now.

“Alone, or can I come with?” He asks, sounding hopeful.

“Of course you can come with,” she says, “but maybe I should have the dagger? You know, I couldn’t wear the sword for - for the wedding. I miss it.”

“Oh,” he says, immediately handing it to her, bloodied handle and all, “absolutely. You could use it better, anyway.”

Brienne takes it at once, wrapping her fingers around it and glaring at the next lord on her left.

She hopes it conveys _if you dare come closer I’m gutting each single one of you and I would have no issues doing it_.

Jaime’s fingers wrap around hers. They’re sticky with blood. She tries to not take notice of it.

“Good,” she smiles. “Shall we walk?”

He nods back, looking so happy he could cry.

She leads him out.

\--

She had thought they could get on a horse and leave at once, but -

Not in the state he’s in.

Before Cersei had her thrown in the dungeons, she had her moved into the Widow’s Tower, where she had put what few belongings she had saved from her journey and a sword she had stolen from the nearby room but couldn’t find a way to use to get herself free because she only managed to hide it before a guard came to bring her away. Which means that if they get there she can lock that room from the inside, see if she can make him remember how things _really_ went and figure out a better plan while everyone else is too stunned to do anything about the current situation.

She leads him through the yard, saying nothing, holding on to his hand and gasping when he holds it back -

“Brienne?” He asks suddenly.

“My love?” She replies, wishing it didn’t feel so _good_ to say it, and that it wasn’t as true as it is.

“Could we go… there? For a moment?”

She doubts antagonizing him would be a good idea, and what harm can it be to visit the bear pit again?

“But of course,” she says, and maybe she shouldn’t sound _fond_ now, but gods she _does_ , and she leads him further down, among the seats, stopping in the place where Vargo Hoat had glared at them when they climbed out of it.

The bear’s corpse is still there.

She tries to not smell it.

“Oh,” he says, his bloodied left hand finding her face, his right wrist touching her hip tentatively. Brienne just sticks the dagger inside the skirt of her dress, figuring that it’s impossible to ruin it any further, and the clothing is good enough that it holds, and then she reaches up with her own hands, framing his face gently, and he smiles at her so, so sweetly, she doesn’t know if she can handle it, but she _will_. “In this light - in this light, you _are_ a beauty,” he whispers, then shakes his head. “No, you’re a knight. Like - like that time.”

“ _That time_? Darling, what do you mean?” She repeats, bringing him closer as he smiles hearing how she called him, her arms loosely holding his shoulders before one of her hands cards through that golden, soft, _bloodied_ hair.

“I don’t remember exactly,” he says, frowning, “but I think we were here. Or somewhere similar. You were naked in the moonlight and I thought you were beautiful, but I couldn’t admit it to myself, so I said you were _almost_ a beauty, but now I can see I was a total fool. There’s no _almost_ to be seen here. But were we here?”

“We were,” she nods, trying not to cry, pressing her lips to his briefly before moving back, wishing his eyes were full of joy for the _right_ reasons, but she’ll worry about it later. Now, she can’t. Now, she has to tell him - “You saved me, you know.” She lets her forehead touch this. “I asked why you came. And - and then you told me the most romantic thing I have ever heard. I couldn’t _not_ marry you, after that.”

“Oh, really? What - what did I say? I am sorry, I don’t quite remember now -”

She smooths the frown from his forehead, kissing it before smiling at him, looking into those lovely, lovely emerald eyes of his, then leaning forward, so their lips are a breath away, and then she says -

“I dreamed of you.”

End.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry.
> 
> Also: the basic plot of this fic is based on [Lucia di Lammermoor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucia_di_Lammermoor) (ie: the opera In Which There's The Most Famous Mad Scene In History Of Music). Warnings: progressive descent into madness/mental health issues/murders/character death (not jaime or brienne cough)/cersei being cersei/abusive relationship (jc)/forced arranged marriage. The title is from a piece of the aforementioned mad scene and I own absolutely nothing as usual. I also swear that the next jb fic I post is going to be back to usual but this wanted to be like this. haha. also many thanks to ao3 user lordhellebore for betaing. *saunters back downwards*


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